


These Hollow Coves

by seelieknight



Category: A Court of Thorns and Roses Series - Sarah J. Maas
Genre: AU, Angst, Autumn, F/M, Halloween, luc is still a prince, possible illyrians in the future chapters, slightly OOC, tam the tool isn't involved bless, this is the strong elain we deserve
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-12
Updated: 2016-10-12
Packaged: 2018-08-22 03:02:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,637
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8270161
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/seelieknight/pseuds/seelieknight
Summary: Elain doesn't only grow things, she brings them back from death. And when the necromancer pulls one of Lucien's older brothers from his grave, tragic revelations are made and a journey to find a prince named Lucien ensues. AU.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Part I of the #ElucienWeek on tumblr hosted by acotarshipweek! This theme is "I'll see you again" but I got ahead of myself and wrote something slightly...different. Haha. In the spirit of Halloween almost being upon us, here’s an Elucien fic where Elain is a necromancer and Lucien is still a Prince of Autumn. This is a heavily AU story, where the Archerson sisters don't speak often and Elain is very OOC (although this is entirely possible). Enjoy :)

Part I  
The Necromancer

There was something estranged in the way she moved, like the tree limbs of a swaying willow became her march to conquer a foreign kingdom. Her spine, straight as the river she’d been born in, was at odds with her freckled arms that swung to and fro as her soft russet hair fell around her thin elbows. Strapped beneath her right breast was an old dagger that appeared more likely to have once been hedging sheers, and cresting her narrow hip was a satchel far too heavy to seem so easily carried by such a waif. 

It was said that her satchel brimmed with the mangled organs of those she’d sung to along her journeys. If the necromancer were to so much as hum a verse, all living creatures nearest to her would be compelled to follow her every whim. Last she’d sung a hymnal of mourning to a widower, the following dusk the unfortunate huntress’s body was found amongst the crops—missing a pair of lungs. The next week a butcher ventured too far into the woods and was discovered in his farm without a tongue by his sons.

The organs were always different, often a heart, but her satchel never grew any heavier nor lighter than when the first sighting of the necromancer had been reported, nearly a century ago.

Elain continued to murmur her song, eyes drawn to a far off thing, and felt around the woods through the perverse bond that had been erected between her and the trees since the day she was born. 

Her two sisters had been cursed likewise with unnatural gifts, but the enormity of each sibling’s powers was too encompassing to be held within the same territory. So they decided to separate, living in the farthest corners of the realm from one another. In her grief, Elain resorted to focusing all her sorrow on her surroundings. Where flowers had once sprouted in her wake, towering oaks erupted from the earth. Where once there had been a gentle girl who nurtured plants, now there was a woman who brought entities back from death. At first they were trivial matters— a few browning leaves erupting into gentle spring roseate. But then she’d come across a dead fox.

And when the creature darted upright and stared at her with wide black eyes, Elain knew her gift for life was truly a gift for death. She wasn't invested in growth so much as she was in decay.

So the lady of spring became the queen of autumn— became a creature of nightmares and a folklore story to be heard around bonfires in the mist of an unkind morning. She became the necromancer, and the name Elain was never uttered again. Not even from her sisters, whom she saw only once a decade. 

Something cold and sickeningly sweet twined with the wind, and Elain froze as she felt the familiar grasp of darkness.

Moss covered this part of the forest, but she could tell the frothy canvas had been laid down after a body had been put to rest beneath it’s roots. Softly perching on her knees, she concentrated on feeling the bond that was currently humming between her and this corpse. Once she had a hold, her mind latched on and swiftly pulled, as if uprooting a weed from a stubborn patch of dirt. 

And when she rose again, she was met with the hunched over body of a boy around her age—at least, the age she looked. His hair was a shocking auburn, like the flames of a dying fire or the slick of blood when it’s freshly spilled. His frail body must have once been muscular and toned for the muted green tunic he wore fell loose against his back. But no matter his physical appearance, Elain couldn't help but marvel at his scent. Unlike the usual corpses she brought back, this boy didn't only smell of decay…but something long forgotten. Apples and cinnamon and woodsmoke.

He coughed, his body wracked in tremors as he kneeled over and dispelled a black liquid from his stomach. He shakily wiped his mouth using the back of his once fine shirt sleeve and turned to stare at the girl dressed in rags before him. Her face portrayed nothing but unflinching surety, and he felt his newly planted heart begin to quicken in time with the pounding in his silent head. 

Slowly, he rose to his feet, towering two heads over her despite looking petrified of her small frame.

“What have you done?” Like melting honey. His voice reminded her of something, but what she couldn't quite place.

She said, “It isn’t a matter of what I have done, but what you will do.”

He shook his head in disbelief, backing away. “I didn't want this.”

“They always say that in the beginning.”

He stared at her, face alight in utter terror. “Put me back. Take away this disguise so I can go back.”

Her lips softened. “I cannot.”

“What do you mean you cannot?” He erupted, still falling backwards although his cheeks had reddened. “You brought me back, surely you can reverse the spell! You must!” There was an awful trembling to his shoulders that made Elain feel guilty for calling forth this man, but truly she had no control over the matter. She sung, he listened. He called, and she answered his plea. However, it would seem there had been a dark misunderstanding lost between their bond. 

“It doesn't work as easily as that,” she murmured. “I was drawn to you for a reason, and now that you are here I must figure out what the reasoning is.” 

“You don’t understand,” his eyes suddenly took on a panicked look. “I can’t be alive. If the others find out what powers unfavored by the Mother took me from my grave, they will try to tear me open to figure out what makes me tick. It was bad enough before, but now…now my brothers wouldn't hesitate to torture me into submission.” As though saying the words made him realize something, he stopped moving altogether and watched as the autumn trees rustled in the uprising wind. 

The Mother, she supposed, would damn her existence if Elain could ever truly die. Not even the Eddies of the Cauldron could go against her and her kin.

The boy’s face had paled, and his eyes went gaunt. She shifted her satchel so that it wasn't so offensively in view of the newly awaken. He lifted a hand to his lips and frowned. “No.” The boy’s eyes darted to hers in grim horror. “No. I almost….I didn't realize he would, would try…it was supposed to be just a game and I—No!”

And to the necromancer’s often unfelt shock, the reborn boy fell to his knees and sobbed into the earth. 

She cocked her head as she watched him, feeling her guilt swallow her whole. It wasn't every day she encountered such strong emotions, and to feel them herself not only from her subjects but from a sleeping emotion buried so deep within her that no powers in this realm or otherwise could wake them…Elain was at a loss. 

She opened her mouth, about to speak when his head snapped up.

“I was hunting him. I was going to kill him. My brother. And I enjoyed every moment of it.” 

And now she found her reason. 

“What was your brothers name?”

He swallowed. “Lucien.”

Part II   
Prince of Autumn

When Lucien woke the following dawn, he felt something shift.

It wasn't so much that he felt the strange pull on some invisible bond rather that he heard someone whisper his name. He had been so certain someone called out to him that he awake from his already murky dream, only to realize he’d fallen asleep once again in his mother’s apple orchard. 

Groaning as he pushed off the ground, the seventh prince of autumn rubbed his temple as he tried to clear his head. There was something about that voice that didn't settle right with him. Not only had it sounded familiar, but there was an evident streak of dread laced into the single word. His name, no less. 

As he walked back towards the palace, it’s spires black from the shade casted against the crimson mountains, and a slight fog permeating around his ankles, Lucien fixed the sword at his hip and gathered up the journals that had been strewn against his face, no doubt which left indents in his cheekbone. 

But then he heard it. Off in the distance, at first a soft echo of bells, the warning gong of an invasion tore through the sleeping court like a frantically spreading forest fire. Lucien dropped his book and staggered at the noise. Staggered, then stopped breathing. 

Then he was off, running faster than he’d let his brothers know he could. 

His lungs felt laden with iron by the time he flew past the villagers readying for battle and through the castle gates, into the heart of the throne room where his father’s advisors swarmed here and there all yelling at once. But even over the din, he could hear the same phrase being repeated again and again. The same words that shaped their lips and struck a chord that nearly cleaved the autumn court in two. And the court very well might have already fallen—for the sight that greeted Lucien when he turned around was something he’d never witnessed before, and would surely not see again for a long time. 

Eris, his eldest, most cunning and manipulative brother, was pale as the hazy moon.   
When the brothers locked eyes, Lucien felt the air leave his lungs. 

“Fletcher has returned. And he brings the mistress of death.”


End file.
